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| Turdell Middleton |
Friday another member of the Green Bay Packers family passed away. Terdell Middleton died five days short of his 60th birthday and it hit me hard since I'm about to turn 62.
Middleton was one of my favorite players. I had became a Packer Backer near the end of the Lombardi era and he was one of the few bright spots during the Wilderness Years after all of our heroes either had retired or were traded away by the time he arrived in 1977.
Middleton became only the fourth Packer to rush for a 1,000 yards in 1978 adding his name to the list of NFL Hall of Famers Tony Canadeo (1949) and Jim Taylor (1960-64) and Packer Hall of Famer John Brockington (1971-73). It had been five years of mediocrity before he gave us something to cheer about.
He never came close after that, but still he remained one of my favorite Packers just for being a bright spot on a team that had the first winning record (8-7-1) since the 1972 playoff team (10-4-0).
It was Bart Starr's fourth year as head coach and wide receiver James Lofton, tight end Paul Coffman, outside linebacker John Anderson and outside linebacker Mike "Mad Dog" Douglass (all future Packer Hall of Fame inductees with Lofton being a NFL Hall of Famer) were rookies with David Whitehurst the quarterback.
Do you realize that its been 48 years since the Vince Lombardi Era ended? For most of the Packer Backers out there that is their lifetime.
